Narrative Techniques In A Rose For Emily

Faulkner´s story “A Rose for Emily” is more or less a classic Southern Gothic tale. He developed the major idea of death or if you want a murder, in a really gripping and astonishing story with an unexpected end. Faulkner used the Modernist narrative techniques as shifts in time and flashbacks. He generally described Emily´s life but he gave a reader an incomplete picture of her life. The reader have to read between the lines if he wants to know why did she stay alone, why did not she like any changes or why did she kill her sweetheart. The narrator, it seems it is the town or more precisely people in the town, watch Emily´s life from a distance from the outside world. Her life is not visible for the outside people except her loyal servant. The narrator is not allowed to come to her closer. As a consequence of many events Emily became some kind of an icon in this small town.

This tale is written with some frightening scripts that contains a mysterious terrifying secret. It includes some typical Gothic symbols as darkness, decay, old ruin house, insanity and murder. For instance, visitors in Emily´s house could see “a dim hall from which a stairway mounted into still more shadow” The dust and horrible smell are everywhere. Also the parlour is covered by long-standing dust and furniture is old, dark, heavy and somehow devastated. Everything in her house emphasizes the frightening setting and as well Emily´s mood and mental state. Moreover, it also includes some Gothic characters as a harsh and selfish father or an insane woman, Emily´s great-aunt. In addition, Faulkner described Emily´s antisocial behaviour which is one of the Gothic features. Emily´s manners and certain circumstances throw her into isolation and loneliness. Thus she found herself at the bottom of the deepest chasm where she found only some offshoots of